A source close to the Indian team confirmed that Virat Kohli would join the T20 World Cup squad on Friday. The former India captain didn’t travel with the team to New York due to personal commitments. He probably needed some downtime after the IPL. Hardik Pandya and Sanju Samson, too, travelled separately, although they have already reached New York and took part in India’s first training session.
The IPL final between Kolkata Knight Riders and Sunrisers Hyderabad didn’t have a single Indian player who was part of the 15-member T20 World Cup squad. And yet, the BCCI allowed some of the players to travel separately. On the face of it, this is not a big deal. Then again, it looks good when the team travels together for a world event.
Apologies for drawing a football analogy, but one would hardly ever see Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo not accompanying their respective national sides, Argentina and Portugal, as they go to an international event. Indian cricket, however, revels in its star culture and the stars are pampered.
Historian Ramachandra Guha had criticised Indian cricket’s “superstar culture”, while resigning from the Supreme Court-appointed Committee of Administrators (CoA) of the cricket board in 2017. But he was a voice in isolation. It would be interesting to see how a strong character like Gautam Gambhir deals with this culture, if he eventually becomes the new India coach. That’s for the future though.
Coming to cricket, India’s preparation for the T20 World Cup will begin in earnest when they take on Bangladesh in a warm-up fixture on Saturday. And there’s a question mark over Kohli’s participation in the game. Will he be ready to take the field after a long flight? A warm-up game ahead of the tournament proper allows the players to get a feel of the conditions. For the first time, the Indian players are playing in New York and they will get an idea about the pitch and the outfield of the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium.
A World Cup in the United States marks a new journey for cricket and the International Cricket Council (ICC) should be lauded for its tireless work to make it happen. Take the case of Nassau County International Cricket Stadium… The venue has been created from scratch. The pitches for the US-leg of the tournament were made in Adelaide and subsequently transported to New York and Dallas.
As for the Indian team, they would like to look into a few issues in the warm-up game against Bangladesh. There’s a school of thought that Kohli and Rohit Sharma should open at the T20 World Cup, especially after the former’s new-found verve as an opener in the IPL. Kohli finished the IPL as the tournament’s highest run-scorer, with 741 runs from 15 innings. And midway through the IPL, he also changed his approach to up his strike-rate significantly. With Kohli and Rohit opening, and Sanju Samson or Suryakumar Yadav coming at No. 3, the Indian batting might have the right Powerplay balance.
Former India opener Wasim Jaffer, meanwhile, has offered a left-field suggestion, recommending that Kohli and Yashasvi Jaiswal should open, with Rohit coming in at No. 3 or No. 4. “Kohli & Jaiswal should open in the World Cup imo,” Jaffer wrote on his X (the erstwhile Twitter) handle. “Rohit & SKY should bat 3&4 depending on the start we get. Rohit plays spin really well so batting at 4 shouldn’t be a concern.”
Going ahead though, it is unlikely that the Indian team management would tinker with their opening combination. The Rohit-Jaiswal partnership is learnt to be their preferred choice, with Kohli at No. 3.
The warm-up game is going to be important for the players like Pandya and Shivam Dube, the two all-rounders, who need to get into the groove quickly. Pandya needs some quality game time after an average IPL, while Dube would like to have a few overs under his belt. The team management will also have to decide if they will use the two seam-bowling all-rounders in the playing XI, or Axar Patel will be picked as an additional spin-bowling option.
Bangladesh are unlikely to stretch India in the warm-up fixture. They are going through a horror run, recently having lost a T20I series to the USA. But India would like to play with full intensity and build some momentum ahead of their tournament opener against Ireland on June 5.